Publication bias: widening the research lens?

15/04/2023

Professor Russell MannionHealth Services Management Centre

University of Birmingham

CLAHRC West Midlands International Scientific Advisory Group

Widening the lens

• Sub-analysis by type of journal

• Sub-analysis by research design/epistemology

• Knowledge mobilisation bias

Journals

Bio-medicalOrganisation&

Management

Types of Journal

Management/organisation HSR/Health Policy Bio-medical

Social Science and Medicine The Milbank Quarterly NEJ

Organisation Studies Journal of Health Services, JAMA

Research and Policy

Human Relations

Health Policy BMJ

Sociology of Health and Illness Health Services Research The Lancet

Health Affairs

Organisational Culture

That which is ‘shared’ within organisations:

• Beliefs, values, norms of behaviour• Routines, traditions, ceremonies, rewards• Meanings, narratives and sense-making

Helps define legitimacy and acceptability:

• Social and normative glue

• ‘The way things are done around here’….

Culture & Performance?

Culture

Performance

Contested nature of culture

Organisations have cultures:

Aspects that are (relatively) stable; that can (in part) be isolated and described; that can readily measured and be targeted for change

Culture as an organisational VARIABLE

Organisations are cultures:

dynamic process of social construction; unstable and fragile insights; multiple perspectives; always open to challenge; about context, power and perceptions.

Culture as RICH DESCRIPTION

Knowledge mobilisation bias

• If the aim of HSDR Research is to produce high quality, scientifically rigorous and academically robust evidence for key decision makers in the health system then publication bias is just the tip of the iceberg

• Need to investigate and mitigate the potential for bias at all stages of the knowledge mobilisation process

• From the commissioning of research (what gets funded and what does not) to all aspects of knowledge linkage and exchange in the health system, including social media reporting bias

• Mixed-methods research design